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Sweetheart, you went to college at a time when you a) could find a job and b) could make enough money from your job to pay for college. You grew up in a time of great post-war entitlements--the entire country remade itself to accommodate baby boomers. I'm not saying you didn't work hard; regardless of how hard you worked, you were working in a system designed to work with you, not to work against you.

Going from UPenn's site (as they provide comprehensive documentation of college prices) and pretending that was where you attended college, you were able to pay only two or three thousand a year in tuition/room/books/etc during the 60s. Currently, you would be paying around $52000 a year for the SAME school. (http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/tuition/1960.html). Your $3000 in 1960 would equal $23,180.98 in 2012 dollars (http://www.calculator.net/inflation-calculator.html). $23180.98 is less than half of $52,000

http://www.clearpictureonline.com/1960-Food-College-Income.html This site gives you a list of college tuitions in 1960, what each tuition would be in 2008/2009 dollars, and then what each college charges in 2008. The price increase from the 1960 tuitions updated for modern dollars to the modern prices is insane--and we have years of college tuitions rising even more since 2008! And it gets worse: those tuitions do not account for room/board/fees.

So, with it firmly established that you are setting up an unfair system where you are equivocating your circumstances with the current ones, and saying because you could afford to pay it yourself everyone else should, DESPITE the fact that you had to pay a fraction of what is being asked of students now, let's move on to the problem of "if you can't pay for it on your own then don't go."

Frankly, that statement is classist. What you are saying, although I doubt this is what you mean to say, is that education should be the exclusive province of the rich. That opportunities for advancement should be kept within set families with money. Frankly, those are the only kids who can afford their own college, ones who have their parents paying for them (be it openly writing checks or from trust funds filled by the parents and in the name of the student). Because someone with only a high school diploma cannot possibly hope to land a job that will pay them enough money to attend college.

You don't realize this because of your age, but new grads are one of the hardest hit segments of the population as far as unemployment--and underemployment--go. Our administration likes to play number games to cover this up, like the underemployment figures being conveniently absent. Even worse, when they give their stats of "college educated unemployment numbers" these are skewed figures. Non-new graduate people like you and me, who have degrees and jobs, vastly outnumber the new graduates, who are in such a unique situation that our stats do NOT reflect their reality.

The end result is that these kids are forced to pay much more than older generations, through (often predatory) loans that they do not have realistic enough chances of making enough money in the near future to ever repay. And if they choose not to go to college, their employment prospects fall even further. It's a lose-lose situation for them.

I know it feels more comfortable for you to blame them for their situation--a culture that you have contributed in and voted to create for decades, whereas they were simply born in the wrong year, I might add--and to call them lazy while patting yourself on the back for working your way through college. But it doesn't reflect the reality that everyone else is living in.

To quote from the article: "The Associated Press has not been able to verify the sources or creators of what are purported to be more recent photographs of Martin circulating online and elsewhere." In other words, MassLive can't say for sure if the less flattering photos are of Martin. This issue has been conflated by other, similar pictures released that were purported to be Trayvon Martin, only to be debunked as coming from the facebook of another young African-American with the same name. In particular, white hate groups have been trying to confuse the issue with fake pictures as part of a smear campaign against Martin.

However, Martin's family has released further photos from right before he died. They can be seen here: http://globalgrind.com/node/829140 These pictures show an older, taller, but still very much young (and somewhat chubby cheeked) kid, tall but very much a lightweight, consistant with the way the family has described him as opposed to the "scary black man" archetype.

A) On the terrible insults lodged at conservative women
---I agree with you completely. While all women in the public eye end up being written about in incredibly disrespectful ways, conservative women seem to attract a more than equal share of misogynic and crude slurs. My guess is that the liberal men (because it is almost always men) feel that since they are "supporting" women on their own side, that makes them not a sexist, so sexist language isn't sexist when they use it! Disgusting, absolutely disgusting.

B) On Malloy's comments on tornado victims
---I didn't know who Malloy was, and hadn't heard/read his comments, but looked them up after reading your comment. Wow. Just wow. What a horrible, bigoted man. He should be boycotted for intentionally hurting families in deep mourning over dead loved ones.

C) On Pregnancy as an illness
---Pregnancy is not an illness, though it is a medical condition to be managed. Moreover, the female reproductive system does more than just pregnancy, and there are very many actual illnesses that do need to be treated and corrected.

D) On Fluke's $3000 a year for her personal sex life
---The $3000 refers to the entirety of law school, which is three years, which comes to a monthly prescription cost of $84 a month (I'm assuming the doctor visits to obtain the prescription are covered in this figure). Birth control pills require the patient to take them every day, including days with no sex and days with lots of sex. The prescription, and cost of the prescription, don't reveal any information about the amount of sex a person is having.

Why not move to a cheaper pill? Well, each person tolerates different medicines and different dosages in different ways. This is especially true for women using the pill to treat medical conditions. So, if a woman's system does not tolerate the cheaper forms well, or if they don't do an adequate enough job of treating the medical condition for which she is on the pill, she may be forced to use a more costly variety.

Additionally, she was not speaking on her own behalf. Her testimony was mainly composed of different women's experiences. One in particular that she spent a bit of time on was a classmate of hers. This classmate had polycystic ovarian syndrome, an illness caused by hormonal issues that causes growth of cysts on the woman's ovaries. The flat out best and easiest way to treat and manage this illness is hormonal birth control pills to correct the hormonal imbalances that cause it.

The classmate in question was fully diagnosed, with physician approval for treatment of this medical issue, which by all rights the insurance that this woman paid for should have covered. However, the insurance somehow thought she had fooled her doctor into thinking she had ovarian cysts as part of a cunning plan to get birth control to prevent pregnancy, called her a liar, and denied her.

Eventually, one of her ovarian cysts got so large that it ruptured. A ruptured ovarian cyst is a medical emergency, and as such put her in the ER where--as pretty common for large, untreated ovarian cysts rupturing--the doctors were forced to surgically remove that ovary entirely (without emergency treatment, the ruptured cysts can cause infections that can kill, so this is a life-threatening emergency).

Where does that leave her now? She has one ovary left, which she could lose to more cysts. Additionally, the trauma has triggered what looks likes signs of early menopause, for a woman of only 30. If they are not able to prevent early menopause, all of her fertility is gone, for good. Her only hope for having kids one day is treating her polycystic ovarian syndrome. In fact, that particular condition going untreated is one of the leading causes of infertility, especially in young women.

This condition is not the only illness that can strike the female reproductive system and needs to be treated. Endometriosis is another one, a devastatingly painful illness that, once it progresses enough, requires complete hysterectomies. Additionally, endometriosis is strongly linked to ovarian and brain cancer. This condition is incredibly painful, causes infertility, and is life threatening. Luckily, there are ways to drastically slow down the diseases progress--you guessed it! Contraceptive birth control pills.

For these reasons, the characterization of Ms. Fluke's testimony of being about the desire to have copious amounts of sex is really depressing. It showcases a lack of research and understanding. Not only that, but these misconceptions can impair women from getting the medical treatments they need to control life-threatening illnesses.

F) Obama and his botched abortions vote
---Just as murderous as policies that deny woman medical treatment for life-threatening illnesses.

One side wants to murder babies; the other wants to murder women. Where do those of us who don't want to kill ANYBODY go?

Well, the question was asking where they stood on a political issue, so I was expecting pre-prepared form emails, like the one that Brown's camp sent but perhaps slightly more relevant than what his people put out (the form his camp sent was related to the issue I asked about, but not the issue itself, and the issue in question is not a small one--basically, I was asking about the TSA, specifically as a crossroads of constitutional issues, government bloat, mission creep, and national security. I figured because so many philosophies all meet on that issue, it would be a good way to see how candidates prioritize, and get a feel for them. The Brown response was poorly written, lacked nuance entirely, included discredited information as fact, and overall was shallow and lazy--didn't tell me much about his stances at all and seemed like it could have been taken directly from TSA webpage. In fact, it was more about "This is the TSA's mission!" then offering any of Brown's opinions on it. I hope that gives enough context to what I asked, what the answer was, and why I didn't find the answer satisfying? With that said, I really don't want to start a derail about the TSA or discuss it here/now, it was just for my personal information).

I do have to say that I'm put off by Ms. Warren's website having a section where you can ask questions strictly as a gimmick for her to harvest more email addresses for her to solicit from--if I had wanted to join that mailing list, I would have signed up for it!

Roughly 70% of the student body receives aid directly from the college (specifically alumni donations), which helps to significantly cut down on the astronomical price tag for students not from wealthy families. As a strategy, Mount Holyoke attracts top students by offering more generous scholarship packages than many competing schools.

I used each candidate's webpage to email a policy question. Scott Brown's people sent me a form letter that, while it revealed that they read enough of what I wrote to determine what issue I was concerned with, did not actually address my concerns as spelled out in my email. Elizabeth Warren's camp not only didn't reply to my inquiry (or my follow-up inquiry), but immediately started bombarding my inbox with spam asking me to donate money.

Don't worry; you accidentally missed a line in the article: "But Joyce has already said he plans to charge Lane as an adult, meaning he could face life in prison without parole if convicted of similar adult charges." Joyce is the prosecutor.

I agree with you for the most part, Kengken, but think it's less about the ideologies of either side and more about money. Our politicians are as corrupt as five year olds allowed to make up their own rules for board games, mid-game. They start from the position of how they will get the most money, and then force their ideology around it. Both parties are filled with self-important blowhards who only care about themselves. I wish I could come up with a solution, but I doubt any candidate not-for-sale would ever have any success, as the entrenched of both parties have too much to lose by allowing a competent person in to play their monopoly game. I mean, let's face it. Hardcore right-wingers have more in common with hardcore left-wingers than they do with the people that they are supposed to be representing.

How about instead we stop overpaying private military contractors for jobs that our own standing military can do? How much money could we save doing that? But then again, if we were to ease up on the use of those contractors, politicians would lose an easy gravy train. As we all know, well-connected politicians abusing their positions to fleece money from taxpayers is far more important than the good of the nation!

Actually, if we were starving to death it would mean something terrible had happened to our farmland. The rest of the world wouldn't watch with a grin, they'd probably be in trouble due to the food shortages that loss of American farmland would cause, and suffering from major rises in food costs as a consequence.

Now, in terms of disasters both natural and man-made, whenever we have a problem our European allies always offer aid. During the Deepwater Horizon spill, even Iran was offering us aid. The Dutch in particular were amazing in generosity of equipment and expertise during that recent disaster.

The idea of America as a rugged individual is an essential piece of our cultural identity, however just because we're strong enough to stand alone doesn't mean we have to. Other countries help us, as we help them. To act like this is not the case is to simplify our history into a shallow myth.

Why are people more sympathetic to people with gambling addictions than they are to drug addicts who have psychological, chemical and physical addictions, as opposed to just psychological? I'm not saying that we should help one group and ignore the other (obviously, helping people recover from addictions is beneficial to society as a whole and therefore justifies itself), but I'm curious as to why drug addicts get such vastly different treatment in the comments on this web site when they are medically more impacted.

Quick question--I see all of these comments about most/nearly all jobs requiring drug tests. I have never been drug tested for work, and I asked around and none of my close friends or family have ever been either. And between us, we cover a lot of industries. What jobs *require* drug tests of their employees? I mean require, not just have it as a possibility that never gets used. Personally, all of the jobs I've held in the past including current do not drug test at all, not even on paper as an ignored policy.

But every time the numbers have been run (or this program tried), the state has spent more covering the costs of the drug tests for people who pass than they save from not providing welfare to drug users or for individuals who are unable to front the initial cash for the test (here I'm going by Florida's program, since it was actually implemented, where the welfare applicant was required to pay for the test and would be reimbursed from the state upon passing).

From a financial standpoint, this program is a waste of money and costs more than the current system.

I don't think we're going to be able to agree on this issue. I do believe that there are people who can't find a job in six months, or can only find minimum wage part-time that is such a drastic drop from their previous income that they are unable to support their family's basic needs without assistance. While I hope that you never face misfortune, though, know that should it happen to you my tax dollars and charitable donations will be ready and available to help you get through tough times so you can get back to supporting yourself when you can ;-)

In this tough economy, if someone loses a job should their children go hungry, homeless, and without medical treatment? Should kids die because their parents hit hard times?

I am more than happy to pay taxes that prevent human suffering. I don't care if a small percentage of welfare recipients abuse the system, I would rather be scammed by a few than sit back and watch people in honest need of help be denied it. It is part of a social contract that we, as an evolved civilization, have decided on and codified into law.